Date of Observation: 03/02/2023
Name: Zach Guy

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: West Elk Air flight covering most of the forecast zone. This ob highlights activity in the Southeast Mountains.

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: The Tuesday/Wednesday storm produced numerous wind slab avalanches, D1.5 to D2, see photos. Most of these appeared to run on Tuesday as well as a handful on Wednesday. The last pulse of the storm on Wednesday also produced many small loose avalanches and a handful of thin storm slabs involving just Wednesday’s storm snow. I spotted two fresh persistent slab avalanches that failed on old weak layers, one was a wind slab that stepped down a few feet on an east facing, windloaded ATL slope near Coffee Pot Pass, in the Southeast Mountains. The other was on a steep, shallow east facing slope near treeline on East Beckwith in the Northwest Mountains. That slope has slab avalanched at least twice this year, so it has an unusually shallow snowpack.
Weather: Clear skies, no wind drifting this morning except on White Rock Mtn.

Date of Observation: 03/02/2023
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic

Weather: Wednesday had an obscured cloud cover all day with very light but steady snow, then snow after dark before clearing after midnight and turning colder. New snow was 4″ with 0.30″ of water and the snowpack is at 69½”. The high temperature was 23F and it dropped to the current -8. The wind was thankfully light and currently it is calm. This is the first visibility in a while but i have not checked for slide activity yet.

Date of Observation: 03/01/2023

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Irwin Area

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: E aspects reactive to AE 4F+ slabs failing on a small grained FC layer from the 2/26
interface. Knocked out some of the hang fire from Pre E and jumped with all our might on the rest but only
got it to inch down but wouldn’t budge.
Premature Evacuation SS-AE-R1-D1.5-I FC (70cm x 23m x 54m)
NC Shooter SS-AE-R1-D1-I FC (40cm x 15m x 53m)
Hollywood & Vine SS-AB-R1-D1-I FC (30cm x 15m x 50m)s

Snowpack: W aspects BTL lacked any slab in the recent storm snow. The 2″ from last night was
reactive and picked up enough speed to run full track on terrain >37 deg. 30-70 cm thick cross loads on EBM .
Buried MFC on Sunny shoulder seem to be breaking down and getting weaker.

Date of Observation: 03/01/2023
Name: Zach Guy Evan Ross

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Mt Emmons. 9,000-11,400ft. NW-N-E

Observed avalanche activity: No
Avalanches: Poor visibility, but nothing we could see.

Weather: Light snow with about 2″ of new by 2pm. Calm winds.

Snowpack: No avalanche problems were encountered while skiing steep slopes. Minimal sluffing in the low-density snow that was accumulating today. Wind loading patterns from yesterday were not recognizable with the more recent snow that has accumulated since the winds died off. This week’s total storm accumulations have settled to around 20 to 30cm.

We dug a test profile on a 34-degree, east-facing slope at 10,700ft. HS was around 265. ECTN within the storm snow. Modified deep tap ect produced N results on both the valentines and late January interfaces.

Date of Observation: 03/01/2023
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Friends Hut area, shared via InReach

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: D2 remote east ntl. 2-4 feet deep. Couldn’t get to crown but crust/facet above crown likely culprit.

Photos:

Date of Observation: 03/01/2023
Name: Eric Murrow

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Friends Hut update via InReach message.
Weather: HST 11″/.9″ , 14″/1.2″ since 2/26. Efficient winds A/NTL yesterday but quiet around hut last night. Light snowfall started early this AM

Date of Observation: 03/01/2023
Name: billy barr

Zone: Southeast Mountains
Route Description: Gothic townsite

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: Snow Tuesday ran until mid afternoon and then held off until after midnight with 24 hour total of 5″ new and water content 0.44″. Only light but dense snow in the past few hours. The wind stayed strong yesterday but has stopped and there was even a bit of clearing before midnight as the temperature dropped to -7F but with the clouds it is currently back up to 8. Currently obscured and calm with a few flakes of snow. Snowpack is at 66½”
Snowpack:

Date of Observation: 02/28/2023
Name: jeff banks

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Kebler zone

Observed avalanche activity: No
Weather: howling winds along Kebler road and zero visibility at times
snow increased to 2-3cm/hr ~1:30PM with low density fluff
Snowpack: Intense snow transport + drifting in the open Kebler road areas

Snow not affected by wind in the thick old growth forest -No drifting or wind slab- @ 9,500-10,700
Lots of tree bombs releasing

Numerous hand shears showed the new snow well bonded to the old surface.
Cohesive, denser Mid-storm layer 10cm thick (heavily rimed + graupel) with a little localized cracking, but un-reactive on steep micro terrain log pillows.

Date of Observation: 02/28/2023
Name: Irwin Guides

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: Irwin Tenure

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: Low loading patterns on W aspects BTL Reactive 8-10″ wind slabs to AS specific to terrain fetches which then transitioned into storm slabs by the afternoon. S aspects BTL stubborn wind slabs cracking but not running.
Ray SS-ASc-D1-I 12-14″ X 50′ X 75′
Weather: Extreme winds early this morning with periods of intense precipitation.
Snowpack: Study plot showed 8″ this morning and another 10″ today with 1.6″ SWE. Not confident in the snow total because of our friendly winds today. Felt more like a foot storm total.

Date of Observation: 02/28/2023
Name: Mark Robbins

Zone: Northwest Mountains
Route Description: the usual anthracites shots

Observed avalanche activity: Yes
Avalanches: third party member in ziggins rode a little further left than the first two, who skied right of the main gully with no reactivity. Entering the main gully right of the windlip/cornice, it broke, and while the rider cut right, it ran with fast energy the full track of ziggins to the bench. I didn’t see it but it sounds like most or all of the windlip broke and ran. Entrained storm snow but no other propagating or stepping down.

wind-lips on right side of big chute fractured with shooting cracks when skiing up to them. Stomped some off, which broke easily but didn’t run far and didn’t produce any results.
Weather: the wind was indeed violent, tho mellowed as the day went on. Snow was coming down heavy most of the time, with the skin track partially to fully filled in between laps with new snowfall and wind transport.
Snowpack: Thick 8 inches of new snow with a little graupel in the mix, with an additional 4-6 or so increasingly fluffy snow falling during the day.